Terrorists kill Jimmy Tag Along - Excerpt, The Devil's Darning Needle

A counterterrorism thriller by Ben R. Furman

The entrance to the Roosevelt Roads Navy Base was less than three blocks away and for the military and civilian personnel working there, the station was a convenient stopping place. El Gordo couldn’t afford to have his Coke machine out of commission long, so it was always quickly repaired. In about a week it would be ready for salting again. Easy money.

Johnny took a bag of rock salt from Frank, who had carried it from home and complained all the way. “You do the heavy lifting because you’re stronger. Quit complaining. I, Johnny el Grande, do all the hard work. Grab the sprayer I hid behind the big bush.”

Johnny screwed off the top, poured several handfuls of salt into the sprayer and carried it into the women’s bathroom. He turned on the hot water tap and waited. When the brackish water faded to tan, he filled the sprayer and stirred it. Satisfied, he screwed the plunger back in and pumped the air pressure as high as he could.

Jimmy signaled El Gordo was still under the pickup. Johnny stuck the sprayer nozzle into every opening, pumped the witch’s brew deep inside, and in short minutes the sick machine threw up its treasure. Johnny grinned and did his victory dance.

Frank scooped up the last of the coins and Johnny signaled Jimmy that it was time to go. The high pitched squeal of a cargo van’s tires ripped the air when it missed the turn at the intersection. It jumped the curb, smashed into the pumps, and spewed a fountain of gas in every direction. Five men in army fatigues with guns jumped from the back. El Gordo ran out of the service bay yelling and waving his lunch bucalaito menacingly in their direction. He was killed with one shot. Frank felt and heard the slap of a bullet as it passed his right ear. A meek groan came from behind. He turned. Jimmy had been shot in the head and crumpled slowly to the ground.

A second van screeched to a stop and the men leaped inside. Frank stood frozen, and then he saw the shooter who was only a few years older than he, pointing a rifle at his chest. In a rush of rage and defiance, Frank spit in his direction.

The barrel rose slowly and the teen, who had so calmly killed El Gordo and Jimmy, gave him a nod of acknowledgement and said, “You’ve got guts cabrito.” Then he pulled a lighted cigarette from his lips and motioned toward the woods behind the station. Frank ran toward the path with Johnny on his heels.

The driver of the van shouted, “Damn it, Ojeda, come on.”

As the van sped away, Frank took a quick glance as the flipped cigarette touched the widening pool of gasoline.

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The Terrorist Attack on Mumbai, India and the Media

By Ben Furman, former FBI Counterterrorism Chief

Here are my thoughts about the media coverage of the terrorist attack on Mumbai, formerly Bombay, India. The media, as it often does, caused my blood pressure to skyrocket by its soft-pedaling of the identification of the terrorist attackers as Muslims. I guess reporting this fact was something it considered offensive and politically incorrect. But this reporting by omission follows the media’s template of not calling terrorists “terrorists” for fear of creating more terrorists; or, refusing to call our war on terrorism a war by defining it as, “regional conflicts of opposing factions.” Only the media can make sense of this circular reasoning. At least the media is consistent. It does the same with illegal aliens that have invaded our country by calling them undocumented workers; or failing to mention in the descriptions of bank robbers that the perpetrators are black, Mexican, and so on. Rather than helping, this ostrich approach to reporting is divisive. We have to get past the reluctance to discuss things as they are without the socially engineered egg shell-walking.

And what’s up with the media’s apparent lack of interest to delve deeper into the tragic fate of the innocent victims at the Chabad Jewish Center? Was the terrorist targeting of the Center about the State of Israel, or was it just a continuation of the gruesome medieval tradition of anti-Semitism? This answer is worth a line or a couple of words from the media.

Why wasn’t the media “all over” the Muslim organizations that rail with an uncontrolled fanaticism against cartoons of Mohammed that they consider insulting? Shouldn’t there be an explanation why they remained eerily silent about the atrocities in Mumbai?

The Mumbai slaughter should be a wake-up call to all Western liberals who believe that jihadism can be defeated through “I’m okay; you’re okay” happy talk. Many Americans, particularly those who buy into the media’s global vision, seem to have been lulled into a false feeling of security because we haven’t been attacked here since 9/11. But Muslim-based jihadism is a world that continues to pose a serious threat to every open democratic society.

A study of ancient history shows us that great civilizations, from Egypt and Persia to Rome and Byzantium, broke down in stages of superficially interspersed tranquil decades. We’re on the same glide path but we're moving at a greatly accelerated downward rate – the time spans are getting compressed. Because of the unprecedented fragility of our communications systems, our intertwined power grids and complex transportation systems, the technological West is highly vulnerable to sabotage and destruction. We need the media to step up, minus its rose colored glasses, and report the world as is, rather than the way the media wants it to be.

So how long will it take us to drive the final nail into jihadism? If we are ever vigilant and take the fight to the terrorists, it will probably take a hundred years or more. And if we don't defeat the jihadists our world as we know it will end.


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